If there is one thing we’ve learned since West Virginia joined the Big 12 Conference in 2012, it’s that it is a touchdown league.
You’ve got to score touchdowns if you want to keep up with the Baylors, TCUs, Oklahomas, Oklahoma States and Texas Techs of the world - teams that think touchdown all the time from anywhere on the field.
If you’re not scoring touchdowns or only kicking field goals then you’re falling way behind in this conference.
Think back to last season for a minute. West Virginia did okay offensively, averaging 34 points and 479.7 yards per game. That worked when they were playing in the old Big East, 34 points per game coming close to where they were in 2011 when they led the conference with an average of 37.6 points per game.
However, in the Big 12 34 points per game doesn’t even put West Virginia in the passing lane.
Four teams averaged better than 42.1 points per game, and a fifth, Oklahoma State, almost averaged 40 points per contest.
Therefore, it’s pretty clear if you’re not scoring touchdowns in this league, you’re not going to keep up, something West Virginia’s coaches have been stressing to their players this spring.
“In the SEC, they play defense and play for field goals and get points because you are not going to score a lot of points in that league,” West Virginia running backs coach JaJuan Seider pointed out last weekend. “Well, you can’t do that in the Big 12 or you are going to get run right out of here. Teams in this league can strike up (touchdowns) just like that.”
Seider brings up the 2016 Cactus Bowl as a prime example of West Virginia’s inability to reach paydirt despite marching up and down the field with relative ease.
“We had almost 400 yards in a quarter and a half and we had just nine points in field goals, where those touchdowns put the game away,” he said.
Part of the deal is probably a matter of the Mountaineers having such a potent weapon in kicker Josh Lambert, whose powerful and accurate leg accounted for 135 points in 2014 and 251 points over the last two seasons. Whenever WVU got into the red zone, the players knew they could bank on at least three points from Lambert.
And West Virginia’s red-zone numbers last season tell the story.
The Mountaineers were successful on 82.8 percent of their red-zone opportunities in 2015, which placed them just seventh in the conference. The six teams ahead of them had a red-zone success rate of 87 percent or higher.
More concerning, however, was West Virginia’s touchdown rate in the red zone - 57 percent. Baylor, for example, scored touchdowns on 75.7 percent of its red-zone scoring chances in 2015. Oklahoma reached paydirt on 66.7 percent of its red-zone tries, the same success rate achieved by Oklahoma State. TCU, which had an 80.3-percent overall red-zone success rate, crossed the goal line on 65.1 percent of its red-zone tries.
Once again, it’s clear scoring touchdowns is how you win football games in this league.
“We talk about it every day,” senior quarterback Skyler Howard said. “Our first emphasis was (limiting) turnovers and now it’s scoring points. When the defense gets the ball on a turnover they are looking to score, and now we’re really focusing on capitalizing on turnovers and getting points out of them.”
A couple more red-zone touchdowns would have made a big difference in close losses last year to Oklahoma State and Kansas State, which in turn, could have meant two more victories for the 8-win Mountaineers.
That’s how close this team was to having a 10-win season and a top 25 national ranking.
“We were talking about that the other day,” senior running back Rushel Shell said. “We were like sixth or seventh in the conference in scoring and everyone else was averaging like 40, 45. Having Josh, we knew we were going to score anyway. This spring, I feel like we need to score more and that’s something we’ve really been going over a lot and trying to make happen.”
More to the point, scoring touchdowns - not just settling for field goals.
The Mountaineers may or may not have Lambert back for 2016, the senior currently serving a suspension this spring for a violation of team rules. And even if Lambert does return, it would behoove the guys on offense to figure out how to get those tough yards needed to reach the end zone, be it straining a little longer on blocks, falling forward when carrying the football or making those difficult throws in tight spaces.
“We always joked last year about Wendell (Smallwood) being allergic to the end zone. Well, at some point we’ve got to pick up our feet and fall forward or balance ourselves to get that extra foot so we don’t fall (short of the goal line),” Seider said.
Obviously, some of that is going to fall on Shell’s broad shoulders whenever the Mountaineers get near the goal line. Shell admits having a nose for the end zone is as much an art as it is a skill.
“I don’t know how to explain it? When you see the daylight you’ve really got to hit it,” he said.
Howard said all 11 parts must be working in unison in order for West Virginia to become a more successful touchdown-scoring, red-zone offense in 2016.
“All of the situational things we do in practice - getting into the right plays and then making plays on the outside and really focusing in on those key blocks, just focusing on everybody doing their job,” he explained. “Usually, when we get down to those critical situations everything is perfect except for that one throw, that one block, or that one play on the outside. Once we bring all of that together and really focus on those critical situations it’s all going to fall together.”
Howard has already played enough Big 12 games to know the score in this league.
“We have the Baylors, the Texas Techs and the high-scoring teams, which make the games a shootout,” he said. “Our defense does a good job of holding them usually to a manageable amount, but you’ve got to score.”
Indeed, to be successful in the Big 12 you have to score – preferably touchdowns - particularly when you get close to the goal line.
